Los Cabos is a short flight from Los Angeles, making it a convenient getaway for Clooney, whose primary home is in Studio City, and for Crawford and Gerber, who live in Malibu most of the year with their school-age son and daughter.

Los Cabos is a short flight from Los Angeles, making it a convenient getaway for Clooney, whose primary home is in Studio City, and for Crawford and Gerber, who live in Malibu most of the year with their school-age son and daughter.

Los Cabos is a short flight from Los Angeles, making it a convenient getaway for Clooney, whose primary home is in Studio City, and for Crawford and Gerber, who live in Malibu most of the year with their school-age son and daughter.

This article originally appeared in the November 2013 issue of Architectural Digest.

Every house tells a story, and in Los Cabos, on the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja peninsula, a pair of vacation homes stand side by side as a testament to a remarkable friendship—the one that George Clooney shares with Rande Gerber and his wife, Cindy Crawford. The name of this compound, Casamigos—or House of Friends—says it all. “We’ve been hanging out for 20-something years,” says Gerber, a nightlife entrepreneur who now focuses on his tequila-and-rum company, Gerber Spirits. “Long before the houses were built, we would travel to Baja together, staying at different hotels and drinking tequila.”

The idea of planting a flag in Los Cabos came several years ago while the two men were there on vacation with a few friends. “We saw this oceanfront lot and thought maybe it made sense to build something,” Gerber says. It was a desire fueled by wanting a place where family and friends could come together comfortably. “Once we had kids, we would go on vacation at Christmas,” says Crawford. “But you’d have to book hotels a year in advance, and then you’d get there and they never quite lived up to expectations.” Plus, Los Cabos is a short flight from Los Angeles, making it a convenient getaway for Clooney, whose primary home is in Studio City, and for Crawford and Gerber, who live in Malibu most of the year with their school-age son and daughter.

Initially the trio thought of creating one house large enough for everyone, but that concept was eventually nixed in favor of two independent structures. “It’s just nice at the end of the night to have your own place to go back to,” Gerber says. Even so, the houses are basically used as a single home, with overflow from one accommodated by the other, and meals and other activities frequently split between the two. “Our lives go back and forth,” Crawford says. “We’ll have cocktails at our place and dinner at George’s, and vice versa.”

Parota-wood beams line the ceiling of the couple’s living room, which features lounge chairs slipcovered in a Libeco linen (at right) and custom-made tripod floor lamps by Richomme; a vintage pillow and throw from John Robshaw enliven the sofa at right, and the rugs are by Lawrence of La Brea.

The two homes were designed and built in tandem, and Clooney happily allowed Gerber and Crawford to take the lead on the project, knowing he could trust their taste implicitly. “Rande has this amazing eye for houses and style,” says Clooney, who nonetheless was a regular presence at meetings and traveled to the site every couple of weeks to give input. “I wanted something that would blend in,” he notes, “something indigenous that would feel in harmony with the setting.”

Another priority, all agreed from the outset, was to avoid the type of hacienda-style villa commonly found along this coast and aim for something more distinctive. The group decided to approach the firm of Ricardo Legorreta, one of Mexico’s preeminent architects, and his son, Víctor, a star in his own right. (Ricardo died in December 2011, two years after the project’s completion, and Víctor maintains the practice.) “A friend of ours had used Ricardo in California and loved working with him,” Gerber says. Adds Crawford, “That property was the first modern house I thought I could live in.”

Like his celebrated mentor Luis Barragán, the elder Legorreta was known for crafting muscular geometric volumes where the interplay of light and shadow is created by large windows and doorways, as well as open-air courtyards. All of those elements are present in the Crawford-Gerber and Clooney houses, which the Legorretas tailored to suit the trio’s relaxed, social lifestyle. “They wanted houses that were very elegant and almost like an art piece,” says Víctor, “but where you would still be comfortable walking around barefoot and in a swimsuit.”

Each structure is entered via a long hallway that flows gracefully into a dramatic double-height central courtyard, which connects to a series of sitting areas, dining spaces, an open kitchen, and, of course, a bar—an especially roomy one at Clooney’s, where the friends often assemble to watch sports on the wide-screen TV. And fronting the beach, each house has its own sizable swimming pool and terrace, as well as ample outdoor seating and dining areas. To soften and contrast with the houses’ expanses of cement plaster, many of the spaces feature wood ceilings, beams, and brise-soleils. “Using wood was something we pushed for,” Crawford says. “It’s not the material the Legorretas are best known for, but we wanted the warmth.”

Tucked away off broad corridors on the second stories are most of the homes’ generously scaled bedrooms—enough to accommodate the numerous guests. “There’s nothing more depressing than being in a big old house by yourself,” remarks Clooney. “You want it filled with friends and family because that’s what makes a home.”

For the most part, the dwellings keep to a palette of neutrals, with Clooney’s being the darker and clubbier of the two. The tone of his house starts with the sand-hued Brazilian quartzite that clads portions of the structure, and it’s a vibe that carries through to the courtyard, where wood slats and a forest of dangling lanterns overhead cast moody shadows across the space, as well as to the terrace enclosed by privacy-ensuring vegetation. “If my house were truly open it would present too many opportunities for people to take pictures,” says Clooney (who stars in the new sci-fi thriller Gravity and the upcoming World War II drama The Monuments Men, which he directed).

The Crawford-Gerber home, meanwhile, is brighter, thanks to a pale Spanish limestone and a courtyard that’s fully exposed to the sky. So while the houses share a similar shape and aesthetic, each is its own unique creation. As Crawford puts it, “They’re not twins, but more like sisters or cousins.”

A fair amount of the furniture is built in, as designed by the architects. Integrated tables and seating in the alfresco spaces are made from the same stones as the walls and floors, while bedroom cabinetry, closets, and desks are made from local parota wood. As for the freestanding pieces, Crawford and Gerber didn’t hesitate to seek advice from interior decorators they know. “Fortunately we have a lot of great friends in the design world,” Crawford says. “We just called on them to help fill things out.”

While many items—the upholstered seating in the living areas, the director’s chairs surrounding Crawford and Gerber’s outdoor dining table—were sourced in the U.S., certain key pieces were custom crafted locally, including Clooney’s living room cocktail table and dining room table. The latter, incorporating a large lazy Susan, is a particular favorite of the actor’s since, as he notes, “you don’t want to have to work too hard when you’re down here.”

As a kind of coda to the project, a year ago Clooney and Gerber, along with another friend, real-estate developer Mike Meldman, launched a premium tequila brand they call, appropriately, Casamigos. “We didn’t just slap our names onto some glue and try to talk people into drinking it,” Clooney says of Casamigos, which produces a blanco and a reposado and has already won a variety of awards. “It’s what we drink whenever we’re at the house.” Or as Gerber puts it, “The best times are when all the bedrooms are filled with guests and everyone’s by the pool with a Casamigos in their hand.” It’s an image that perfectly captures the open-armed spirit of this pair of breezy, sun-kissed getaways.

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